This page outlines some databases that use citation-network based approaches to searching. A method by which articles are recommended on the basis of their connection to other articles, not solely on the basis of their content. This approach can be very effective in some circumstances and good for an introduction to a topic, but does not allow for a comprehensive, replicable search strategy required for a systematic review of the literature.
They are useful as a starting point or for expanding your search for literature on a topic, but should not be used as a substitute for established library databases and search tools.
The University of Bristol does not hold a subscription or licence to any of the following products, but you may find them useful supplementary tools for your research.
Connected Papers
Connected Papers can be useful for quickly generating a list of relevant papers to investigate. The tool works by taking a specific paper and then identifying similar papers via it's co-citation network (using Semantic Scholar data). It selects the "most closely related" papers and displays them as a graph or list. These papers are likely to be relevant, but it does not provide a comprehensive list and a large number of relevant papers may be missed - it does not display more than a certain number of papers, no matter how relevant others may be.
Connected Papers is a commercial tool. An individual account is free for up to five analyses per month or a single month's access can be purchased for a small fee.
Research Rabbit
Research Rabbit works by taking a single paper or group of papers (e.g. a reference list from EndNote/Mendeley/Zotero) and generates recommendations. It shows a graph representing citations between the source paper and the recommendations, identifying the most 'connected'. The algorithm used to generate the graphs is not transparent, but it probably includes co-citation analysis, keywords, text similarity and co-authorship.
As with Connect Papers, we do not recommend using it for a systematic review of the literature, but it could be useful for scoping and gaining a broad overview of a topic.
The tool is free for individuals.
Litmaps
Litmaps is another tool to generate citation maps based on other works citing a given source paper. Once again, it does not provide a comprehensive list, but for an initial overview or as a supplementary search it could be useful.
Litmaps is a commercial tool. An individual account is free with limited searching or a single month's access can be purchased at a student rate.
Keenious
Keenious is a tool that analyses the content of a document using large language models and then generates a list of relevant papers. These suggested papers can then be filtered by date, citation count or open access and can be exported to reference management software.
Keenious is a commercial tool, but limited-access is available to individuals for free together with the option of a less restricted account for a monthly fee.